March 6, 1937: Birthday of Valentina Tereshkova, the first woman cosmonaut.
Tereshkova piloted the Soviet Vostok 6 on June 16, 1963, almost exactly 20 years before the first U.S. woman astronaut, Sally Ride, went into space.
Tereshkova later became a high-ranking member of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
